Switzerland Today
Greetings from Switzerland,
As a UN Special Rapporteur warns of Stalin-like repression in Russia, Switzerland is once more criticised for its lack of implementation of sanctions against Moscow, and now the US has withdrawn its sanctions officer to Bern. What will this mean for US-Swiss relations?
If the Western front is problematic, the Eastern doesn’t seem more promising, as the tentacles of the Iranian regime have reached Switzerland, with an Iranian activist fearing for her life.
This and more in today’s briefing.
In the news: unprecedented repression in Russia, sick Swiss bees and probe into Church sexual abuse.
- The level of repression in Russia is “unprecedented” since the Stalinist era, according to the UN’s Special Rapporteur on the country. The number of complaints from individuals to UN mechanisms has risen sharply, Mariana Katzarova said in Geneva today.
- All honeybee colonies in Switzerland are sick. “If beekeepers don’t do something about it, all the colonies will be dead in one or two years,” warns bee specialist Peter Neumann.
- The public prosecutor’s office in canton Valais has launched preliminary proceedings in connection with possible sexual assaults in the Catholic Church.
The US sanctions officers leaves Switzerland: are bilateral relationships at risk?
For months the United States has been criticising Switzerland for its lack of implementation of international sanctions against Russian nationals, but now the Biden administration has opted for what some might consider a bolder move.
The US sanctions officer to Switzerland, Clara Kim, will leave the country at the end of September and there are no plans of replacing her, as reported by Swiss newspaper BlickExternal link today. Kim was sent to Bern just nine months ago to work on a new banking and finance agreement with the Alpine country.
So, what went wrong? “Despite the increased interaction, it is difficult for the embassy to maintain a Treasury Department presence in the foreseeable future due to slower-than-expected progress and the absence of Swiss investigative powers“, explained a US embassy spokeswoman. She also added that exchanges with Swiss authorities and banks have increased, but the US is still dissatisfied with the result.
Swiss authorities have always rejected the criticism of the country’s financial decisions, stating that Switzerland has blocked Russian assets worth CHF7.5 billion ($8.5 billion), but after the announcement of Kim’s return to Washington, the US embassy spokesperson said that Switzerland could further implement sanctions against Russian oligarchs and companies. Namely by strengthening the law on money laundering and setting up a transparency register. Although these measures were discussed in Bern at the end of August, it is still unclear what impact Kim’s return will have.
The tentacles of the Iranian regime reach Switzerland and activists don’t feel safe anymore.
Protests against the regime in Iran have been shaking the country since the late 1970s, but after last year’s death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old student who was arrested for not adhering to the mandatory hijab law, they have gained momentum abroad. But so has the repression by the Iranian morality police.
Today The GuardianExternal link interviewed 15 activists who have been campaigning abroad and looked at the threats, intimidation and attacks they receive even outside Iran. One of them, Maryam Banihashemi, lives in Switzerland and does not feel safe in the country anymore.
Banihashemi moved to Zurich in 2016. After she became vocal on social media about the regime’s repression, her online profiles have been flooded with death threats. Being a social media expert and having studied at Tehran’s elite Sharif University she is familiar with the dangers of the digital world, but now fears for her security more than ever.
She told The Guardian how she has been followed home after attending political events, both in Zurich and Bern. And last June a person working for the Iran’s Revolutionary Guards delivered her a message saying: “They intend to assassinate you there.”
The only solution that Swiss police suggested was to have her name and address changed, as well as hiring private bodyguards. But that is something that Banihashemi, like many other Iranian activists, cannot afford. “After years of repression for being a female CEO in Iran, I finally felt free in Switzerland. After this year, even Europe is not safe for me,” she told The Guardian.
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